Putting together a package of unreleased material for inclusion with the online release and DVD re-release of Stringer. Spending today in Adobe Bridge collating and screening interviews, production stills, behind the scenes photos and outtakes. First job has been to rework the DVD artwork for cover and disc. Our re-release of the DVD will be timed the Northern flu season 2010 and will be aimed at Finland, UK, Germany, France and USA. These are the regions who have registered the most views of the original web trailer that was uploaded in 2007. I always imagined using just the yellow X to promote the release and will try to use this imagery for the online release of the web-episodes reversion of Stringer.
The yellow cross is easy to remember and can be used in a variety of ways and lends itself to use on walls and doors. Branding needs to be simple to be sticky if the image requires too much deliberation it has failed. In the story the yellow cross is used by the government to mark those who have been infected and need to be quarantined. I speculated in writing the script that if a pandemic got out of hand only the large stadiums used for rugby matches and other sporting events would provide the authorities with the infrastructure needed to process and contain thousands of sick people.
For Stringer we used the Manuku Belladrome in Auckland as the location for our Death Camp. As luck would have it the Belladrome was double booked and we had to shoot our living hell of chicken wire and underfed extras in between the time trials for the womens pursuit heats. Naturally it was a little tense but we got the shots and our Death Camp looks rather foreboding and grim. The re-Release has also required a considerable amount of re-editing and we have shortened the duration to 85 minute. The omitted scenes will be available as extras on the DVD. In its new length the story is taut and muscular and should be a vast improvement on the original version which was over 110 minutes and needed the flab cutaway. Now if I just had 50 thousand dollars to shoot a little more splatter and Stringer could like a zombie find a new shuddering life. In a way this long trip to distribution may help the movie reach its final and optimal shape.
